Reviewing Russ's list at
http://lists.debian.org/debian-enterprise/2010/08/msg00004.html
I'm trying to imagine what are the issues that if we were to solve them,
then Debian would work better in the Enterprise.
If I might hazard some speculations:
- If each package in Debian supported a config-time option for the required
functionality, then it might not need to be packaged as a private archive
- So if heimdal was a config-time option OR if -noheimdal and -withheimdal
packages were in Debian's archives, then a whole class of these private
packages could go away, correct?
- If that's correct, then for a large class of problems we just need to
work with upstream to re-engineer the software to support config-time
options or (I hate to say it) include in Debian multiple builds of
packages for different use cases
- Is this the same situation for the Cyrus SASL and OpenLDAP packages?
- In this class of problems, I just see it as buggy upstream software.
Let's identify the issues and either submit bug reports or negotiate
with upstream to design better software.
- Could it be this simple: just fix badly designed upstream software?
- Another class of these packages occur to me as possibly just needing
new upstream versions?
- So that's an issue of helping Debian build packages for new
upstreams and backporting them more quickly. Maybe we need more help
on some of the Debian teams that maintain the package or negotiate
to build a team to relieve an overworked DD.
- Some of these packages are just not yet in Debian. So we need to form
teams around these packages and get them into Debian, no?
- Of course, some might have licensing issues, so some legal or
political effort may be required.
- Some do not even have upstreams. So the issue is how to form an upstream
project that can meet many people's needs with shared resources.
Are there any other classes of issues that have led Stanford to needing
to build so many customom packages?
Which of these pieces seems big enough to be worth doing yet small enough
that we can build a project to solve it?
--
We are on a spaceship; a beautiful one. It took billions of years to develop.
We're not going to get another. Now, how do we make this spaceship work?
-- Buckminster Fuller
CJ Fearnley | Explorer in Universe
cjf@CJFearnley.com | "Dare to be Naive" -- Bucky Fuller
http://www.CJFearnley.com | http://blog.remoteresponder.net/